


Mourning Bird Calls

by samiraxlula



Series: Life is Like an Hourglass [6]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, Detective Comics (Comics), Under the Red Hood
Genre: Creepy Jervis Tetch, Dark Jason Todd, Gen, Jason Todd Has Mental Health Issues, Jason Todd is Robin, Stalker Tim Drake, Tim Drake Has Abandonment Issues, Worried Alfred Pennyworth, Worried Parent Bruce Wayne
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-21
Updated: 2020-06-22
Packaged: 2021-03-04 04:20:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,341
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24757669
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/samiraxlula/pseuds/samiraxlula
Summary: Just when Jason thought he could learn to be Bruce’s son again, Tim Drake shows up, reigniting his anger.
Relationships: Alfred Pennyworth & Jason Todd, Tim Drake & Jason Todd
Series: Life is Like an Hourglass [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1723129
Comments: 31
Kudos: 166





	1. Believe in Ghosts

Slipping past the tall trees, stone walls and gates along with all of the various alarms, sensors and traps, the costumed figure climbed up the stately Manor walls and hefted himself onto the slated roof before sliding his own bedroom window open.

“Hello, chair.” The boy slipped off his cape and hung it over the piece of furniture neatly.

“Hello, books.” He greeted as he passed by his filled shelves while pulling off his armoured tunic and hanging it up in the closet, grabbing his baseball bat before it fell and repositioning it more steadily.

“Hello, bed.” He tugged off his boots and slipped them underneath the frame as the white noise of silence began to echo in his ears and didn’t shut up despite his wanting it to.

Sitting down on the edge of his bed, Jason’s shoulders slumped over and with a pained expression he looked up to see the visitor waiting for him in the dark shadowy corners of his bedroom.

“Hello, me.”

The corpse of the Red Hood stared back at him, his neck slashed open and bleeding out all over the floor.

Drifting closer without taking a single step, the older and angrier version of himself snarled with his teeth bared. _‘This is what you deserve.’_

He could feel all the anger and rage roll off the ghost of his future past, making him shiver from the sheer intensity of it all as he sat there on his bed, alone in the dark with not even the lights from the hallway peeking out from underneath the door granting him any relief. 

_‘What did you think? That you could just be Robin again?’_ Taking him by the shoulders and shaking him violently, his ghost seemed unable to rest in peace being so full of fury as he was.

“I don’t know.” Jason could only get out in a hoarse whisper.

_‘I know what to do. You can take all of that pain, all of that blackness and put it all in a bullet and put it right between Bruce’s eyes.’_

“I can’t do that anymore!” It was a whispered yell that made him lower his head again in shame. “Maybe that means I’m useless or broken but I just...I just can’t.”

The two versions of himself stood there facing each other in weighty silence, poisonous green eyes holding the gaze of youthful blue ones, and it was then Jason knew how messed up he was as a person. He probably ought to be checked into Arkham now that he was talking to the ghost of his own self.

A knock on the door made the vengeful ghost disappear just as quickly as the door started to open and reveal an English butler dressed in a robe, striped pyjamas and crossed arms.

“I see you’ve finally returned, Master Jason.” Alfred entered the room with an incredibly displeased expression as he eyed the cape lain across the chair. “At _two o’clock_ in the morning.”

When Jason didn’t respond right away, the butler’s expression changed upon noticing the air of melancholy surrounding the young boy sitting on the edge of his bed with his hands tightly clasped in his lap. 

“Whatever seems to have happened, lad?”

Alfred was immediately before him with his kindly aged-grey eyes checking for injuries and steady hands that took his and didn’t shake, making the boy bite his lip to fight back an outburst of emotion.

_Dead and buried._

“Nothing. It was nothing important.” Robin shook his head as Alfred gently peeled off his domino mask to reveal Jason’s swimming blue eyes. 

_Forgotten and replaced._

It seemed as though there were so many contradictions wrapped up in his skin and flesh and bone. He hated and he loved. He was depressed but also starting to be happy again. And now here he was, starting all over again just as he had two years ago, with Alfred looking worriedly at him while he sat there in his childhood bedroom confused and angry and hurting.

He was alive. Inexplicably, miraculously alive. And he hated every minute of it. 

“Master Bruce sent word that he should be home in about three days.” Alfred held his hands warm and firmly while Jason blinked furiously to keep the salty tears for falling down his face.

“Okay.” He replied very quietly as he focused on the wrinkled hands holding his own, the two staying in a quiet solace while Jason gathered himself again, careful to not jostle the edged shards within him that were threatening to cut away at his heart.

In the two years he had been back, pretending to be nothing more than an oddly mature child at times, he wondered if there was any moment in which he had slipped and Alfred had noticed something odd about him. 

While he did have the benefit of the doubt being a ‘child,’ they were still both actors. However, since Alfred had only known the previous him for only around twenty-four days, it was possible that he didn’t know there was any difference to even be had.

“Would you care to speak about it?” Alfred tried again once he had assessed that the boy had calmed himself somewhat from the verge of an emotional breakdown.

Jason shook his head mutely, not saying anything.

“Master Jason,” Alfred spoke in a firm but caring tone. “It is my responsibility to make sure you’re alright and well while Master Bruce is away.” 

“It’s fine, really. Nothing exciting happened.” Jason tilted his head towards his lap as he gathered his knees to his chest, slipping his hands away from the butler’s. “I just want to go to sleep.”

“Very well then, lad.” Alfred still looked concerned but accepted that his charge didn’t want to talk at that moment, standing up with a final rub of the boy’s back before leaving the room.

“Ah.” Alfred paused before closing the door as if he remembered something. “While you were out Master Jason, you received a letter from a Mr. ‘Eddie’ Bloomberg. Perhaps you could pen a return letter while you are grounded.”

And with that, he closed the door behind him, leaving Jason alone and exhausted, both mentally and physically, as the blustery January winds began to pick up outside.

 _“Robin?”_ The voice of his replacement still echoed in his ears, making him cover them with his hands, knees pulled up to his chest as he rocked himself. He wanted so badly to hit something, anything, just like how he’d destroyed that room when he discovered Bruce hadn’t killed the Joker.

Jason didn’t want to think about it. He didn’t want to think at all.

Reaching over to grab the phone he’d been gifted for his thirteenth birthday from the dresser with a sense of desperation and letting the screen light up, the keys made a slight buzz with each number he tapped before it started ringing with his call.

"Hey, Bullock. Any news from the drug bust?” His voice immediately lifted into a cheeky, Robin-esque one.

“Aside from it bein' successful? Not really, kid. We’re mostly dealin' with the fallout right now, n' got a bunch of kids in the hospital dealing wit’ catatonic withdrawal. Youngest one’s only ‘bout ten.”

“Damn.” Jason unravelled from himself while he listened with a more serious expression.

“Tell me about it. However, the autopsy on the Crime Docta’ is what was really intriguin’.”

“Oh? Do enlighten.”

"They found some surgical scar below his hairline. When the mortician was openin’ him up, he found some sort o’ implant. A biochip, he said. N’get this, the only company makin’ anythin’ remotely simila’ is WayneTech.”

 _WayneTech?_ Jason’s brows scrunched together as he lay back on his pillows, thinking back to both Bradford Thorne and Killer Croc and how completely out of character they had both been. He doubted Bruce or Lucius would have allowed the development of something that could be used to control other people.

... _Bruce_. How could he forgive being replaced by him too?

He cut off that line of thought to bring himself back to the more emotionally-removed issue at hand.

It was possible, he supposed, that there could have been projects that both of them didn’t know about going on in the WayneTech labs as the company was always testing, inventing and collaborating with new ideas. But even if they had been working on any sort of implants, why on earth was Bradford Thorne the one surgically inserting them as a part of some ‘scheme,’ which he was also being controlled into working for?

“Thanks, Bullock. I’ll talk later.” Ending the call abruptly, Jason stood up to put the phone face-down and back on the dresser.

Removing the remainder of his uniform and heading off to brush his teeth and get ready for bed, Jason decided firmly then-and-there that he would just focus on this case, see it through and pretend Timothy Drake didn’t exist.

It shouldn’t be that difficult. 


	2. Who Aren’t Quite Dead

Jason walked in with a face full of makeup and a head of red hair. 

Since he didn't want the attention that came with being either the CEO’s kid or Batman’s junior partner, he deemed it best to be in a full undercover disguise while he infiltrated WayneTech.

It seemed almost as though last night’s tears became this morning's current of electricity, as Jason was wholly determined to complete his mission task within his set time limit, thinking of it as a sort of training exercise similar to the ones he used to do with his instructors.

Having taken advantage of the time Alfred gave him by grounding, Jason calculated he had about three hours to find out what he needed to and get back into his room before Alfred, who was currently still scrubbing down the entire cave with disinfectant, noticed.

It was something the butler did bi-monthly considering how much they bled out and brought in all manner of samples down there. So while he was occupied on the cave, Jason had all the time in the world since he didn’t even need a whole three hours to complete what he needed to.

Slipping under the eye of Marge, a kindly head receptionist who always insisted on giving him a bright red lollipop whenever he tagged along with Bruce, the redheaded boy went unnoticed by all of the security guards, who were currently changing shifts to the night workers.

He wasn’t a League of Assassins trained former-bat slash former merc and crime lord for nothing, after all.

There were three divisions of WayneTech’s research and development department, industrial, electronics and medical. What Jason needed to get into was the electronics lab to go through its computer systems. 

And since the labs were restricted with only high-level security clearance, he had to be absolutely spotless with his sneaking in as to not leave behind any evidence of his being there.

As Lucius Fox came out of the elevator with a _‘ping’_ and walked up the hallway with another figure furiously tapping in something he was saying with a tablet, Jason was forced to dart into the men’s washroom to avoid being seen by the man who had a very good chance at recognizing him. 

With the door swinging shut behind him, Jason thankfully found the bathroom stalls all to be empty but just as quickly lost that feeling of gratitude when he saw who was washing their hands at the sink.

“ _Repl—_ Timothy?!" Jason startled, completely not knowing what to do when coming face-to-face with the very person he had determined to ignore as an existence in the men’s bathroom.

Worse still, he realized that he couldn’t even call his replacement, ‘replacement,’ since the kid hadn’t even done any replacing yet at this point in time.

“You know my name?” The kid beamed as if he had just won the lottery, though he had only washed his hands and was currently dripping them all over the floor, seemingly forgetting about drying when he also saw who was in the same bathroom as him.

“N-no. I don’t. Nevermind.” Jason shook his head, attempting to make a speedy escape out of there, even at the risk of bumping into Lucius.

He shouldn’t be this shaken up in front of him. Besides, he was currently a strawberry-blond with brown eyes and a completely different face. The kid shouldn’t have even been able to tell who he was.

"Wait, I can help! I know who you are!”

Jason whirled around disbelievingly to face the kid who had quickly pulled some paper towels out of the dispenser to pat his hands dry with and then toss into the trash.

"You’re Robin! I'll always recognize you!" 

His replacement spoke with such conviction and stars in his eyes that for all his trained facial control, Jason had to cringe in disgust at the fanboyishness of it all.

"How did you even— you know what, nevermind. You're just creepy." 

Irritation he couldn’t control rolled off him as Tim lost that lottery look while he just left the bathroom and carried on with his mission, calming himself with thoughts of beating him into the ground.

Of all the black-haired and blue-eyed boys in the world, Bruce just had to pick the most annoying kind. A bored, privileged rich kid who slept in a warm bed and went to private pre-schools that per semester cost about the same as the annual income of a family in the East End.

 _Damn it all._ And here he was planning on just ignoring his existence.

“Wait, Rob—!”

“—ert.” Jason slapped a hand over the kid’s mouth, who had stumbled out of the bathroom to follow after him. “Just Robert will be fine.”

While Jason knew that Tim had been the one to discover Batman’s identity, he didn’t know the when and how of that. So just to be sure, he’d have to continue maintaining his ‘Robin’ persona for the time being in front of him. 

“Hey, you two kids!” A security guard called over, having spotted them while Jason had let down his guard dealing with the brat and simultaneously holding back his rage, even without the madness of the lazarus waters fuelling it this time around.

“What do you think you're doing here this late by yourselves?” The security guard inquired suspiciously. “You two brothers or something?”

“Yes, No.” They answered at the same time, thinking up different excuses. 

Tim and Jason looked at each other for a second before the older boy gave a look that showed he clearly couldn’t have cared less to explain himself and only gestured towards Tim to answer the guard.

“Our dad works here and I lost one of my contacts when we were visiting him. He told us to go back and find it while he waited in the car for us.”

The guard paused for a long minute, as if he was scrutinising the excuse from every angle before he nodded in acceptance. 

“Alright, but just be quick about it and don’t go near any of the labs, alright?”

As he walked off, Jason couldn’t help but be impressed with how flawless that was for a freakin’ ten-year-old. If it came down to it, he was prepared to have gone for a silent takedown and then stash him in a utility closet. 

“Not bad, kid, thinking up a lie like that.” Jason had to nod at the brat’s talent for distracting people, even though it had been what drew attention to them in the first place. Maybe there was some use to glean from the creepy brat.

“Actually, I really did lose one of my contacts.” 

“You need glasses?” 

“No, I need _contacts_. I hate glasses.”

“Let’s just get this over with, okay?” Jason blinked at the exchange as he moved on, seeming to just accept the fact that the kid was going to follow him around no matter what like some duckling.

“Okay, Robert!” Tim chirped, happy to be included. “By the way, can I be called Alvin too? Fake names are fun.”

“Don’t push it.”

“Oh, okay then.”

As the two ducked past other security guards, Jason had to shove Tim’s head down more than once to keep him from hitting a laser or being spotted before the two made it to the lab floor despite Tim’s sing-song chanting of, “sneaky time, sneaky, time∽” underneath his breath.

“The security here is _fascinating_.” Tim peered over his shoulder while Jason casually bypassed all the security measures in under two minutes.

“Kid, not now.” Jason gritted his teeth as he moved on into the lab. “Also, the sound of your breathing is incredibly annoying, so please try to stop doing that at your nearest convenience.”

Heading towards the computers, Jason logged in to try to discover anything about the creation or assembly of a specific biochip. 

The project records were routinely protected through secret passwords and a series of codes that were constantly being updated. Fortunately enough, it was Bruce who designed the system and the man would always create an overriding password that could bypass all the standard security procedures if the need arose. 

A password that Jason also knew.

While he enjoyed the silence, combing through the various files and records, he couldn’t help but turn to look back and see what his replacement was up to, only to bewilderedly gape at the sight of the kid holding his breath.

“ _What the—_ stop holding your breath!”

“But you told me to.” Tim exhaled, regaining back some of the colour he had been losing.

“I…” Jason didn’t even know what to say to the kid, merely turning his face back towards the screens in disbelief at how weird the thing toeing along after him was. 

“What are we looking for, anyway?”

“ _I_ am looking for anything related to a possible project named Sabbath, but there doesn’t seem to be anything here. I wonder what I’m missing.” He mumbled the last sentence more to himself. 

“Maybe look for a Saturday or Sunday.”

“I tried that already.” Jason waved his suggestion off aggravatedly, finding it unhelpful.

Taking a different route to his searching, the faux redhead began looking for anything that was made and had the ability to emit electronic pulses. He didn’t end up finding anything with a project name but did come across a security report for some stolen parts that matched what he was looking for. 

Clicking on the video feed that was attached to the report, the two boys watched as the dated footage showed the mostly covered face of a man breaking into the lab and leaving once he had obtained certain pieces of electronics. 

“Huh,” Timothy or Alvin as he wanted to be called, seemed to find the footage especially interesting. “He looks like the guy in the photo.”

“What photo?” 

Logging out after saving the file onto a drive of his own, Jason still had plenty of time to spare and cross the city to get back home from the Old Gotham district in which the company was built. 

“A photo...I took.” The kid seemed embarrassed by the admittance of his photography hobby and for some reason, Jason just noticed now as he stood that they were the exact same height even though Tim was physically three years younger than him.

He supposed he would have to hold that against him now too. Just to be petty in return since his future-replacement had completely ruined these past two days for him with his unwanted presence. And even worse still, it seemed as though he was in possession of useful evidence.

"I'll find you later to check out those photos, okay. Now go _home_.”

Thinking back to the background checks Talia had sent him, Jason knew that both of Tim’s parents were still alive. So why the hell were they letting their troublesome ten-year-old kid run all throughout Gotham at the most random hours? Even if they were out of the country most the time, didn’t they have a nanny or something to make sure their son didn’t die? 

_Why am I even thinking about this? I don’t care about the spoiled rich brat._

While Jason had to struggle to survive living on the streets after his mother overdosed, and then later still struggled to be accepted even though he wasn’t Dick Grayson, this kid waltzed right in months after he’d been buried and stole anything Jason could have had, completely replacing the memory of a dead, failed soldier with a new, perfect ideal.

Or at least, that was the idea he’d had of him.

Speaking of ideas, he realized he had none to explain what the replacement was even doing at WayneTech at this time in the evening.


	3. Just Ethereal Memories

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry that this chapter is so short. I promise I'll make the next one much longer.

He'd always been alone—utterly, utterly alone.

One thing Tim hated about being in the Drake mansion for extended periods of time was how utterly lonely it was.

Don’t get him wrong, he knew that his parents' work was important and that was why they were away so often and for so long, but even when they were home for a rare week’s stay, they never seemed to be interested in him. 

He was left standing or sitting there like some forgotten toy while they argued back and forth between themselves, almost as if he was something that had been given to them as an unwanted gift and therefore left abandoned in some boarding school or vast mansion, so that he would be both out of sight and out of mind.

Was it too much to ask for some small measure of attention? Like a pat on the shoulder or a ruffle of hair? 

Robin— _Jason_ was a kid just like him. Even though he spent most of his time by himself and was either ignored or looked down on by most of the people around him in high society or the academy aside from Mr. Wayne and their butler, he never looked lonely or sad.

He was just so... _cool_.

He had all this confidence and maturity, never seeming like he could be bothered by what anyone thought or said about him. Like he knew full well who he was, what he wanted and how he was going to achieve it. 

Tim wanted to be just like him someday.

He looked up to Dick as well, of course, but Nightwing was nearly ten years older than him. Jason was...well, _Jason_. He walked the same hallways as him in school, attended the same assemblies, played in their school’s baseball team and was just right there, close enough for his camera’s viewfinder. 

He watched him debate with the librarian during lunch, help a school janitor fix a leaking pipe and expose some of his classmates trying to rig the exam all without being exposed himself. And that was only as Jason Todd. Robin...he was magic.

If Tim was being honest with himself, he knew it was a rather sad and pathetic fixation to harbour, becoming obsessed with the brightly-coloured ideal that he would place on a pedestal of his own making. Like his Robins were perfect and could be nothing but. 

Even despite knowing that all, harbour it Tim did, because what else did he really have?

Sitting there on the edge of his bed, Tim fiddled with his camera while he waited for Robin's promised visit, the snow beginning to fall heavily once again outside. 

“Hey, kid.”

Jason was suddenly balancing on his balcony ledge perfectly with the one foot he landed on, startling Tim enough to fall backwards and scramble to say anything that wouldn’t sound stupid in front of his hero.

“R-Robin!” 

He managed to stutter something out as his blue eyes widened in amazement that Jason had even bothered to come see him, despite having said he would. Nothing like his parent’s empty promises of homecomings. 

For some reason, his reaction elicited an even odder paused reaction on Jason’s own part that looked something like discomfort or even...guilt?

“Is that...a picture of me and Batman on your nightstand?” Robin inquired bewilderedly as he made his way into the Drake mansion and out of the cold, making Tim flush a bright red and stumble backwards quickly to knock the picture on its face.

“N-no?”

Tim felt like he was about to have a heart attack. He had been so focused on hiding all his other pictures either underneath the bed or in his closet, carefully placed in shoeboxes, that he had completely forgotten about the framed ones on his side table.

Robin raised an eyebrow at the downturned picture frame with a single, long ‘uh-huh’ sound before a thought seemed to strike him as he examined a small desk in Tim’s bedroom with an older film camera, a couple of digital cameras, and several lenses.

“You weren’t at the docks a few days ago, were you?”

“No, I was walking around the city.”

Jason seemed to consider this for a moment before nodding like Tim had confirmed something else for him. “You wanna show me that picture you were talking about?”

“Oh, right.” Tim shook his head, having apparently been lost in the moment before he handed the colourful teen an envelope with three snapshots in it, which the older boy looked through before commenting upon.

“Glad this confirms things for me.”

“Wait, you already knew?”

“Wasn't it obvious? Biochips, neural interfacing, mind-controlled thugs?” Robin pointed out the evident clues. “Anyway, I just needed some more concrete evidence to deliver. Thanks, kid.”

As he made his way to exit back out through the balcony doors, Robin felt a tug on his cape behind him and turned to see an almost desperate look on Tim’s face. 

“Will you come back?” The ten-year-old couldn’t help asking, even if his face burned with embarrassment and awkwardness. He didn’t want Robin to leave him alone too.

Though his hand was already on the doorknob, Jason paused to furrow his brows for a long minute before he finally asked, “Doesn’t anyone worry about you?”

“I try not to be a bother.”

Robin looked displeased with that answer, which Tim knew was his fault. He should have known that this would have happened really. Mother would have been terribly displeased if she had heard how needy he sounded. 

He just wished that he could just do something to _fix it_.

But that wasn’t important right then at that awkward moment. The important thing was that Jason accepted it. Nodded. Quietly and uncomfortably said, “How about you call me sometime. If you need help or something.”

Reaching over to grab a sticky note pad, he scribbled some numbers on it with Tim’s red pen, the ink bleeding through to the other side before he took his leave, disappearing into the snowy night.

He really was _cool_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Maybe I should write a one-shot of Jason's side to this meeting. I did want to do Tim's POV here but I realised that there's a lot going on in Jason's head rn than I should probably put down someplace.


	4. Playing Tricks With Your Head

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know I said I'd make this chapter longer, but I didn't think I could write this much tbh.

A flutter of bird’s wings were heard as shadows crept up the walls of the seemingly abandoned Victorian-era home, along with the wind whipping through the barren tree branches that surrounded the property, covered in a thin layer of white snow.

‘It’s just an old house.’ the neighbourhood kids and passers-by would say despite the undeniable shiver they would all get when they walked by it. Like most people, they would only see only the surface and never think to look for what might lie below.

The collective community sentiment didn’t detract from the creepiness of the abandoned house any, Jason noted as he snuck through the back gardens to the house, while supposing it was an appropriate location for someone so obsessed with a piece of nineteenth-century literature.

Weaving through the trees, he pressed himself up against the trunk of one as he noticed movement closer around the house. No doubt the ‘security’ to protect the man inside.

“Hi, Robin!” 

Tim’s head popped up from behind a different tree, lacking the camera and instead wrapped up warmly in a thick green scarf and matching mittens with which he waved.

“ _What_ are you doing here, Tim.” Jason groaned through clenched teeth, more irked than anything else that Tim once again managed the feat of following him without notice.

“I realized who you were going after and tracked him down here too. It wasn’t that hard.” The kid had the audacity to shrug as if he had only done the most normal thing in the world.

If this was the persistent tenacity Bruce had to deal with when Tim came knocking on the Wayne Manor doors, maybe it wasn’t such an unfathomable action to have just caved in and made him Robin after Jason. The kid was too exhaustive to say ‘no’ to. 

“Why do I even bother— look, just _stay_ here while I go deal with this, okay?” Jason sighed with a frozen cloud of breath as he darted off towards the house with Tim’s ever-observant eyes following him.

Despite being brightly clothed, Robin still managed to be stealthy enough to not garner any attention from the various guards patrolling the grounds. 

However, stealth didn’t seem to equal awareness, Tim discerned as he watched one of the guards who were wearing white rabbit masks notice the bird sneaking on ahead from his own position behind and was about to jump him, prompting the younger one to take action. 

Perhaps Robin hadn’t heard him coming, so he took it upon himself to knock the thug down in the football tackle his dad was always trying to get him to do, even though he really couldn’t care less for the sport.

“Tim, I _heard_ him coming!” 

Robin whirled around to see another rabbit mask-wearing thug swinging at the unaware younger boy and in his rush to reach Tim, he failed to prevent the second goon from hitting him cleanly out.

*

Rusted pipes creaked in the distance and rotting floorboards moaned upstairs as the cold winter did nothing to hide the house’s age, even down in the clearly renovated cellar.

“Damn. He really built a whole dungeon.” Jason tutted as he came to, somewhat impressed with the setup he was currently in, though he had to blink rapidly to take the new scenery in.

“You’re awake!” Tim choked out from beside him as the teen hero started to rouse. 

Turning his head to the side, it seemed as though the kid had been attempting to fight back against their captors as his hair was mussed and his left cheek bruised and swollen. 

He was also noticeable not in any sort of bondage like Jason was, which he supposed was smart enough on their part given his ‘R’ symbol, tugging at the ropes that held him to feel for any give and not finding enough. He’d have to break something of his it seemed.

“I thought you weren’t going to wake up.” Tim’s breathing started to hitch, which was an odd role-reversal to witness considering how it seemed as though he was always the one sobbing over this emotion and that his child-body couldn’t cope with the strain of.

Clutching at his green mittens while tears started to form, Jason realised for the first time that he had an actual ten-year-old child with him that wasn’t secretly an adult. He had been so focused with the irritation of Tim’s being and following him around that he neglected the fact of his being in the yet unwritten present-past.

Sighing for what must have been the tenth time today, Jason moved forward, reaching as far as the bonds would let him, and pressed his forehead to Tim’s in a comforting gesture, which was really all he could do for him at that moment..

Nonetheless, it was almost as if Jason reaching out to him had broken a spell, Tim jerking forward to fling himself at Jason’s chest, throwing his arms around him and crying great big tears despite it being somewhat awkward since they were about the same height and build.

“I’m so sorry,” Tim finally managed to get out, stuttering and shaking over the words as he clung to the teen hero. “I’m so sorry.”

Even though Jason couldn’t move his arms to comfort the kid back, he found himself sympathizing nonetheless with how frightening this all must have been for a ten-year-old way out of his depths. 

As quiet descended upon them once again like a thick blanket, Tim scooted closer to Jason, resting his head upon the older boy’s chest, which Jason oddly didn’t feel annoyed by him doing.

Quietly thinking to himself, Jason realized that he and Tim were never really supposed to get along, and at first he hadn’t even wanted to with his future replacement. The sheer weight of the fact made their current situation ironic—almost painfully so.

When he came back from the dead, alone and hurting, there was always some part of him that wanted to fly home where he had a dad, butler-grandfather, mostly absentee elder brother and a place. He thought he’d always have a place there.

He just needed to get back to his dad. 

But then there he was— all bright and grinning in the surveillance shots, wearing _his_ uniform and flying right alongside _his_ dad and not-so-absent-anymore brother. He had come back to a life that didn’t even belong to him anymore. 

He had been usurped and he was furious.

But then he died a second time by the hand of the very man he had once called, ‘dad.’ He had been lost and filled with thoughts of vengeance, but had never once considered living any kind of life beyond that until he realized that things were very different from what he had initially perceived. He might never be able to forget, but he could learn to forgive.

“Oh, _children_.” 

A shorter man walked into the cellar with a Cheshire-like grin that could be seen as he stepped into the light and took in the sight of them both while flanked on each side by henchmen wearing white rabbit masks.

“How very _exciting_.”

“Good grief, did you get creepier from than the last time I saw you?” Robin couldn’t help but look disgusted by the Mad Hatter as he shifted against the ropes he was tied with and even Tim began to look worried again.

“Is he a... _pedophile_?” Tim whispered to Jason.

“I am not a pedophile!” Tetch stomped his feet cantankerously, top hat shaking.

“Yeah, he just _likes_ kids.” Robin raised his eyebrows pointedly at the mention of the oft-spoken accusation, making Tim nod understandingly with an ‘ahh’ sound.

“It is not tea-time at this moment, so what does bring you two children to this little wonderland of mine?” Jervis Tetch smoothed down his clothes to calm himself, just like the doctors at Arkham recommended, useless as they were. 

“We know you stole from WayneTech!” Tim burst out, pointing his mittened finger which Jason would have face-palmed for if he weren’t tied up.

“It can hardly be classified as theft to take back the very bits of circuitry _I_ originally invented.” Tetch spoke crossly about his brief time as a neural scientist working for WayneTech, his tone going up and down in that strange pattern of intonation he was known for.

“Oh, well. Congrats on your first villain monologue.” Robin whispered over to Tim, which also served to humour the distressed child as the Mad Hatter began to rant about his masterplan. 

“I simply put the pieces back together in a manner that suited my needs. It took a few failures to gain success, of course, but such a thing hardly mattered in the grand scheme of it all.”

“Like with Croc and Thorne?” Jason inquired good-naturedly.

“Killer Croc was one of many insignificant thugs to me. Doctor Thorne could admit to the brilliance of my plan but unfortunately could not handle so many of our subjects dying. I couldn’t have him tattling on me, you understand, so I had to... _control_ him.”

“There were many other failed soldiers, which was a shame I admit, but I always had the promise of more.” Tetch’s eyes became even more crazed than normal for him as he tilted his head from side-to-side, examining Robin. 

“Like _you_ , my dear mouthy hatchling. You would be a perfect little soldier for my project, wouldn’t you?”

“Eh.” Jason tilted his head to the side as if considering the question. “I was always told I didn’t follow orders well.”

“Get him prepped for the surgery.” Tetch clapped once before waving his mindless rabbits off, the two thugs moving to cut Robin’s ropes and drag him away from an increasingly distraught Tim. 

Jason, on the other hand, wasn’t bothered in the slightest as he was pulled along and found himself rather pleased with the idea that came to mind.

As he was brought to a room that smelled distinctly of tea, disinfectant and fried wiring, Jason was thrown onto a table without much grace as the two mindless goons began to strap him down. He timed for three counts in an allowance before headbutting the mindless rabbit and knocking the other out cold with a palm strike, slipping his arms out of the restraints and leaping up off of the table just as Tetch walked into the room.

“Are we ready for the procedure?” The Hatter inquired without having looked up from his snapping on gloves.

“Yes, we are.” Robin descended on the short man, knocking him neatly out before Jervis could even tell what hit him.

*

The steady dripping of a leaky old sink could be heard in the background of the operating room, where a young-looking vigilante seemed to busy himself with doing something in.

“What’s all this now?” Tetch immediately began thrashing against his restraints as he awoke to Robin cleaning off the evidence he used to create the incision for the bump which Tetch now felt in the back of his neck.

“No, no! I mustn't be late. Alice needs me!” The Mad Hatter looked to be having a fit of some sort to Robin’s obvious amusement as he turned around to watch the man rouse.

“I don’t think you’ll be able to help her,” Robin’s voice changed to mock Tetch’s own pitch and rhyme. “I’m going to play with your head and soon you’ll be dead!”

Walking around to the side of the operating table, the still restrained Jervis Tetch noticed with bugged-out eyes the small little device in the boy’s hand and knew what had been done to him while unconscious. 

“I know.” The bird crooned as he watched realization take over his expression. “Kids can be so _cruel_ , can’t they?”

Bringing the microphone close to his mouth, Robin’s expression became wickedly gleeful. 

“You are going to completely destroy this place in an attempt to get rid of all the evidence once you realized you had been cornered but tragically perish in the very fires you started.”

He then smashed the microphone underneath his boot heel to make his a finalized order.

“What kind of Robin are you?” Jervis, though now unrestrained and starting exactly what he was told to do, could still speak in horror as his body moved to obey.

“Me? I’m the _bad_ Robin, of course.”

*

“Time to go, Tim.” Robin peeked with his masked face into the cellar-dungeon where Tim was still trapped, the boy raising his head to take in the teen with a relieved expression.

“I knew you’d be alright!” The fanboy sparkle came back into his baby blue’s which made Jason as uncomfortable as the first time he had them aimed towards him, opening the door to let the kid out.

Moving past the two knocked-out guards that were previously guarding the cellar, the two made to escape the rest of the basement by heading back up the stairway they were brought down unconsciously.

However, as the foul smell of smoke started to become evident, Tim had to be pulled behind a corner to hide as a parade of thugs in rabbit masks came running down the hall to follow the smell. 

Finding that they could no longer use the stairs as an exit without fighting around fifteen men all at once, which Jason considered for a minute before remembering he had a ten-year-old with him, the two looked at each other.

“So...Plan B?” Tim inquired as if to ask if there even was one. 

“Bat-rule number three, kiddo:” Robin informed him scoldingly. “There’s never a ‘Plan B.’ It’s Plan Two. ‘Plan B’ implies we only have twenty-six.”

“Noted.” Tim nodded, evidently taking the lesson to heart as Robin pulled something out of his yellow utility belt.

*

_Fsssshhhh._

_Tok!_

After pushing the piece of wooden flooring up and away, Tim crawled up and out onto the main floor with Robin, who had been the one to boost him despite being the same height, following right behind.

The smell of gas and smoke building up and mixing was evident now even on the main floor, and they would have to rush out before the two components created the explosion he knew was coming. 

After all, Talia didn’t have him train with a number of chemists and explosives specialists to not learn anything. 

Racing out of the old house and leaving behind all the mindless ‘soldiers’ as Tetch had dubbed them, even though he was now among their ranks, the roar of the flames behind him finally exploded into a ball of fury, the explosion knocking them both forward and onto the singed grass. 

As the two boys slowly looked up to witness the sight of a tall, dark figure standing there shrouded in shadows with the dying crackles of the explosion’s flames accentuating his own silence, an involuntary shiver came over them.

With how much time Jason had been spending around ‘Bruce Wayne,’ he had almost forgotten how _unnerving_ the Batman could look. He really did live up to his brand of ‘inspiring fear into the hearts of criminals,’ which on the other hand didn’t really help his image of being a ‘hero.’ 

Though that was why he had Robin, of course.

“Robin.”

“Batman.”

The two greeted each other in a completely flat tone with a nod each, unminding of the fire blazing through the collapsing house behind them.

“And who is this?” A dark glove waved towards the child next to his own, who was supposed to be grounded according to Alfred, and not crawling out of exploding houses and giving him grey hair. _One_ week he was gone.

“Ah…” Jason looked towards his partner-in-crime, who was near shaking in hero-worship from being so close to the Dark Knight. 

“This is Tim. He’s a friend of mine.”

.

.

.

Ra’s al Ghul observed his loyal followers as they fought to the death below the pagoda he stood upon, mastering their skills in combat as his daughter came up from behind to join him in the viewing.

“Tetch had proved useless, Father.” 

Talia’s clasped hands behind her back tightened as she noticed the smaller form of her own child also joining the fighting ring under the supervision of his tutors. Her anger could only grow with the fact of his being too young for all of this. All of what she had gone through. 

It created another large crack in the loyalty she once held unwaveringly towards her father.

“I trust you can make certain our involvement goes unnoticed by the Detective.” A slight turn of the Demon’s head was made to show his acknowledgement of Talia’s words. 

“Without question, Father.” She nodded dutifully.

“Good. I know your sentiments. Just know that I will not hesitate to send Shiva if you are compromised.”

“That would be a waste of her time and mine. I will get it done.”

“That’s the answer I was looking for.” Ra’s fingers idly tapped against his wine glass as he settled into a thoughtful expression, the desert breeze sweeping through the compound and rustling his green robes.

“Although Project Sabbath may have proved unfruitful, my interests in Gotham have not waned. Perhaps I shall pay a visit of my own in due time.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So...don't say I didn't warn you, but I'm killing someone off in the final story. (Shall we call a number to vote in? lol)


End file.
